Lily is a Hui Chinese Muslim who has come to love Jesus. She speaks of being Hui and Muslim somewhat interchangeably, and primarily as a social identity. Hui Muslim is her ethnicity, her family’s tradition, the way she fits into the community, and the way herpeople distinguish themselves from her nations’ ethnic majority – the Han people.
Although she knows little about formal Islam, the rules and rituals of Muslim community life shape her. Daily shopping and food preparation must be halal, and annual festivals must be observed. Perhaps most importantly, rites of passage
surrounding marriage, childbirth, and death must be completed to satisfy her family’s expectations. Here we follow her through the customs and rites of passage surrounding the birth of her second child and hear her speak about her understanding of their forms and meanings.
As she has journeyed toward greater faith in Christ in spiritual matters, her social identities as both a Muslim and a Chinese have been
challenged but never abandoned. Lily shows how her ethnic minority uses religious rituals as cultural identifiers and simultaneously embraces certain traditional Chinese rituals. Throughout her journey, Lily finds ways to preserve Hui cultural forms while
pursuing her new life in Christ. Her biggest challenge comes as she considers not what she might leave behind, but whether new life requires new rituals. This reflection on Lily’s story ends with a challenge – the challenge presented by the Christian rite of passage into the body of Christ – baptism.
Read more of Lily’s story and its lessons here: https://whenwomenspeak.net/article/vol-5-no-1-december-2019-lily-one-hui-womans-journey-to-new-life/
Image credit: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-05/an-china-female-imams-feature/5298860
Brook has a life-long calling to serve Christ where he is least know, and to bolster Asian Christians in missions. Brook has lived among the Chinese Hui people for more than ten years, speaking most of that time as a missionary in northwest China
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